Sofia "The Great"

Hello internet people who happen to stumble upon this page. I welcome you to my little section on this blog. I am warning you to leave right now or else you might become enlighten to all my crazy thoughts about books, cats, and world domination. Proceed with caution.

Sometimes you reach a point where you just can’t take any more — a breaking point, some call it.

The day I watched my husband murder the woman who was pregnant with his child, my point didn’t just break, it exploded like a full magazine’s worth of hollow points firing through the barrel of a fully-automatic AK-47.

Literally.

I am no longer his American Princess, nor am I his slave.

Now, I’m a murderer in hiding. My name was Bryleigh Carter Oliveira, and that was my story.

Translucent is one woman's story of breaking free, starting over, and learning to trust again through willful submission.

AHHHHH! I really wanted to like this book. I knew about a quarter of the way in that this book wasn't for me. I think the only reason I did not give up was because the book is really short, and I also bought a sign paperback copy. The big issue I had was the fact that I did not like the couple and truthfully I rarely not like a couple in a romance book. "Translucent" features Blake ( Bryleigh) who has gone through some pretty emotional, abusive past to the point where she is suffering from PTSD. She constantly has flashbacks and unknowingly hurts herself in her sleep. She meets rich, alpha, controlling male lead, Madden who falls for her pretty fast. I just felt that Blake was pretty damaged and instead of going for a nice guy she goes for a guy who wants to be called Sir. Didn't she already leave a controlling relationship to go to this? Yeah I know Madden is nowhere near as bad as Blake's ex but it still did not sit right for me. Therefore I couldn't root for this relationship.
Another issue that I had with the story was the transition between the past and the present. The book features a lot of intense violent flashback scenes and then just a couple of pages later it will feature a sex scene. No bueno! Talk about a mood killer!
I already knew the book was going to end in a cliffhanger (saying a book is book 1 is a BIG CLUE) but I felt the book was already too short so it did feel kinda rushed.
This isn't the first book I've read from Erin Noelle so I knew she had writing skills but because I did not like the couple I will not continue the series.

Warning: Upcoming adult language. Also the views expressed in this post are mine alone. They do not represent the other platypires. Therefore if you have an issue do not take it up with the other bloggers.

FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! Okay I feel better. I got that out of the way but seriously that is what goes through my mind anytime I see a reviewer who says they do not give reviews under 3 stars. It makes me want to scream and flick them off. Maybe I shouldn't take it so seriously and I shouldn't let it get to me. I know we all have a different experiences when we read a book, and no matter what, not everybody will like the same books. My issue is with people who purposely refuse to give their honest opinion but want to be taken seriously as a reviewer. They go out of their way to let everybody know they do not give negative reviews and think its bad for others to do so. AHHHHHH! I guess I should start at the beginning.

My face when I see a blogger who admits they will not give one or two star review.

I started reviewing books for myself only. I read over 100 books a year and even though I wish I could remember each book, the fact remains I can't. My reviews were basically notes and they went along the lines like this "OMG this book is awesome" or "This book sucks balls." I will admit they were not the best but I was doing it for myself not for anyone else. Then I started having friends ask me for recommendations or they would add any book I rated 5 stars to their TBR list. I started to take it more seriously. My friends know me and they know where I live. There is no way I could sway them into the wrong direction. Honestly, I would expect the same in return. Also because I run a book club I will check reviews before adding a book to our poll. I am responsible for 20 women reading a book that I recommended. I try to look for books with high overall rating. I understood that friends of an author would rate a book highly and I heard of authors buying reviews. Hence now I check for books that have hundreds and even thousands of ratings. I just never thought of people who think that rating a book one or two stars is just being mean. WTF?

This is bull shit!

I wonder if these same people feel the same way when they go out to eat and have a negative experience. Would you warn your friends & family about a restaurant that give you food poisoning or gave you bad service? Aren't you worried about hurting the chef or owner's feelings? They are people too. They tried to create good experience but maybe they were just having a bad day. But I guess that's different. In my opinion. FUCK THAT BULL SHIT. There is no way I would recommend a place that gave me food poisoning and I am going on Yelp.com and leaving an honest review to warn others. Anyways, like I stated before not everybody will like every book. Once a month my book club reads the same book and I hear everybody's honest opinion They can range from 1-5 stars all on the same book but at least its honest. I know none of them are faking it. Plus how can you expect people to follow your reviews if you lead them into the wrong direction?

Below I included some of my one star reviews. In all honestly I tend to enjoy a lot of books I read. Most of my book reviews are 3 stars or higher but I am not scared of giving a negative review. If you want to buy any of these books then please do so at your own risk. I also don't feel my negative reviews should be constructive but I understand if other people feel differently. I respect that.

So I am not sure what book these critics read but thats not the book I read. I do wonder do critics even like reading? Do they just read a blurb and write a review and all other critics join the bandwagon? I understand why some readers turn to bloggers to find the next book they want to read. Cause all these critics should not be paid to write reviews. Anyways, that being said this book sucked. You gotta to at least like the characters and I just couldnt. They were all annoying hipsters trying to be cool and edgy. Lets use another cool way to talk English, cause that hows it gonna be in the future but let not explain anything. you just gotta be cool to understand. Maybe if you were a hipster you would like this book but if you are just a regular person then walk away.

I am glad I did not pay for this book and that it was a free download. I'm just bummed that I wasted my time. The book started off with promise and I was actually happy that the female lead was Hispanic. Being Hispanic you don't see many of us in leading roles in books. So I did start this book with an open mind and ready to love it. Unfortunately, as I continued reading, the story started falling flat. I didn't understand repeating conversations when the POVs were changed. I didn't suffer a memory lapse between chapters and I thought the repetition was unnecessary. Also there was no sexual tension or even a build up to their love. It was just two people going on boring dates and they just liked each other. They did a lot of cheek kissing and some making out but that's it. Even the dialogue wasn't that impressive. Read a Nicholas Sparks book or a YA romance novel and you will get more action. I was just surprised that other romance novels and the erotic novel 50 shades were mention. Obviously, Angie is a fan but everything else in her romantic life is tame. Anyways, the icing on the cake was the Spanish dialogue. I am not sure if I am the 1st Spanish speaking person to read this book because I do not see any mention of it in other reviews.Let me just say that the Spanish was horrible. Translating word to word English to Spanish is not how it works. Ex: fecha means date as in 11/23/14 not a romantic date. Any Spanish speaker knows that. Using the words usted is a formal way of addressing someone. Not how you would address family. "El tio Raul, como estas?" means "The Uncle Raul how are you?" As a reader its not my job to correct Spanish in books so I won't continue with the other mistakes, but any time Spanish was spoken it was horrible. Honestly it would have been best to leave the Spanish out. The book ended in a cliffhanger but I don't care enough to continue the story.

I keep going back and forth between one and two stars with this book but in the end I got to stick with one star. I just can't recommend this book to anybody I know nor do I feel better after reading it. If it wasn't for my book club I would have stop reading this book after page 100. I am a fast reader but this book took me longer than a month to read because it was so boring. I just kept getting distracted. I think I read the book jacket and, the synopsis of the book 100 times. I kept waiting for the plot to happen and for all the blurbs on the back cover to make sense. I think that's what pissed me off even more than the book. The book is critically acclaimed and loved by many that I kept waiting for it to get good. But, after 544 the book never really picked up. The story is about Ursula who keeps dying and gets to relive her life and she gets to change the outcome. But, she doesn't know this keeps happening. She suspects that something is different but doesn't know for sure. She experiences deja vu. So when something bad happens, I kept thinking, "Well, did it really happen? cause she's gonna die soon and those bad events never occurred." Anyways, after finishing this book, I immediately looked up the 5 star reviews. I had to know what I was missing. I guess people loved the worn porn. Yes, I will admit it did have some quotable quotes but that IMO doesn't make a 5 star book. I will also admit that Kate Atkinson paints a very clear picture of war time in Europe. But I also feel that a book should not be dull and should have an end game. Not wait 544 to get to the point. I really just stop caring. So if you are suffering from insomnia and need a book to put you to sleep, then read this book.

This was a very cute adorable read. We've all seen those movies where the romantic leads pretending to be dating but are in fact falling for each other. Well as a chick-flick fan this book hit the right spot. Yeah the story-line was a t...

I don't know whether to give this book 4 or 5 stars. It was pretty damn good. My only complaint is that I got kinda lost in all of the space jargon. Seriously, I felt kinda dumb because everything sounded so smart that I'm just gonna as...

This year I'm planning on rereading some of my favorite books. I'm glad I started with one of my favorite authors. This book is still really good. This time I listen to the audio book instead of actually reading the book. My only complai...

“Love isn’t roses. It’s those little square caramels and a root beer from the gas station because he knows that’s your favorite snack. It’s watching a musical with you without groaning. It’s handing you your glasses at night because he k...

I want to first start off that I got to meet the author at Houston author bash earlier this year. I was immediately drawn to the cover of this book. I just think it's a beautiful cover. This was the only physical book that I bought at t...

About ME!

I was born a long time ago in a hospital in Houston At least that's the story that was told to me. I can't recall these details so I can't say with 100% accuracy that its true.

Fast forward some years and I'm an adult women who has a passion for reading. Some might say its unhealthy. Those people suck and should burn in fiery pit. My passion for reading lead me into running the best book club in Houston. I also like to attend author signings. I don't consider that stalking if the author advertised the event. Now when I'm outside their window that might be another story but lets not get into semantics. .

I enjoy reading a lot of different genres from traditionally and indie published books. I don't go out of my way to check how a book was published. If the book captures my interest then that is good enough for me to read. Now that being said I will review books in the genres below: